Travelling long haul first class with a baby

Actiongirl_2 · 21 January 2009 at 10:59AM

Hi All,

As a combined wedding presents from family/honeymoon/trip of a lifetime, we have been able to book first class tickets to australia with BA. We have never flown 1st before (or anything but economy in fact!) so are obviously VERY excited!

We are taking our daughter who will be 1 when we fly.

I wonder if anyone can please advise on:

What kind of food is likely to be available to us in the cabin that I can feed our daughter - i tried calling BA last night, and although the lady I spoke to was lovely, she couldnt really tell me much! Our daughter eats finger foods at the moment - pasta, fish, veg etc and will let us feed her the odd pot of babyfood if she is feeling really kind but we can't rely on it for the trip.

Is there likely to be a babychanging flip down stand in the loo on the plane?

Has anyone got any tips on keeping a one yr old happy for that long without really irritating the CEO's and other VIPS in the 1st class cabin? Our daughter is now almost walking, very inquisitive, and very active when she is awake although she rarely cries which I am hoping lasts until the trip!

Any tips would be most welcome.

thank you.

Moonchild · 21 January 2009 at 11:57AM

Wow, you lucky, lucky person! Are you breaking your journey up along the way?

If not, here's what I did with my 2 year along the way (someone will be along to advise on food questions!) when we flew to Bali (which is still 20 hours).

We spent the previous month telling her what you do on a plane (eat and sleep, particularly sleep!), and she took that in well, and slept a lot. We did shifts to take care of her (basically about limiting the problems she would cause for other passengers as she liked to run up and down the cabin).

We had 'hidden' some of her favourite toys on the previous month, and 're-introduced' them at stages throughout the flight which made her really happy. And also bought an etch-a-sketch thing which she loved.

At one point though she did watch the one episode of Bob the Builder on repeat for 4 hours

Can I ask if you are in First or Business (BA operates Economy, Premium Economy, Business & First on Sydney flights). If it's first, you will be getting looks and comments from the other 12 people in the cabin!

shoppaholic_returns · 21 January 2009 at 12:01PM

Lucky for you,but unlucky also, I can say from personal experience that you will probably be frowned upon,generally people sit in this cabin to get away from kids, noise etc,and aus is a looonnnggg way!!

Good luck!!!

mystic_trev · 21 January 2009 at 12:14PM

Yeah got to agree with the above. It's a lovely gesture of your family to send you First class, but I doubt your fellow passengers will be very happy. Most First Class passengers with young children will usually have them seated (or with) Nanny, in either Business (or usually:rolleyes: ) in Economy.

You have as much right as anyone else traveling in First. The problem is you may be made to feel very uncomfortable!

donny_osmonds_mad_fan · 21 January 2009 at 12:22PM

hi, well you have as much right to travel first class as anyone else, enjoy it

hope u have a great flight. I have only flown economy with BA with a small one, not sure if first class kids meals differ from regular kids meals but my kids got a pasta in a tomato sauce, and whilst there was a flip down changing table it was very small and more suitable for tiny babies rather than wiggly 1 year olds lol

M4RKM · 21 January 2009 at 12:25PM

I'm going to echo the sentiments of the last 2 posters. 1st class, and an inquisitive child wandering around will annoy fellow passengers. please make sure she sleeps well, and also doesn't go wandering around, or making too much noise..

I personally, (not that i fly 1st much), would be glaring at you if your child make an ounce of noise that disturbed me from enjoying my flight in 1st class..

that's just my opinion, and flame me if you want!

M

shoppaholic_returns · 21 January 2009 at 12:30PM

Absolutely!

Sounds rotten,but its the way it is!

hopefulfooluk · 21 January 2009 at 1:13PM

Totally unrelated but if you haven't already, don't forget to sign up for BA's Executive Club before you go - you get mountains of points and miles for a return trip first class to Australia.

conradmum · 21 January 2009 at 2:30PM

I've flown with babies and young children many times and believe me, you get enough tutting and eye-rolling in economy, let alone first class.

I personally wouldn't have the brass balls to do it. The disapproval and complaints if the baby cries would spoil my trip.

If you think you can face it out, good luck to you!

sturll · 21 January 2009 at 2:33PM

I think you would be as well giving upper class a miss and getting a bulkhead seat in Economy. This would surely save you a huge sum of money. Probably more than enough to take another holiday later in the year.

Actiongirl_2 · 21 January 2009 at 2:36PM

ha ha ha! thank you all for posting!

I know exactly where you are coming from on the 'non-baby' thing! The approach we took was that they wouldn't put a fixed bassinet in 1st class if babies weren't acceptable (and I should stress that we have paid several hundred pounds for her to travel with us!).

I am hoping that she is going to be a charming little thing all the way there, and not make a squeak!:rolleyes:

Good tip on the toys, I will start filtering soon. She also loves books all of a sudden, so will take the same approach with those.

We are also thinking of taking a dummy - she has never had one, but she might take to the novelty of it which will help with sleep etc i hope.

Any more tips are greatly appreciated!

Ps, I need to stress that we bought the tickets in September. If we knew then, what we know now, we may not be taking the trip....instead we might be redundancy planning with it.:o But we did buy them, we can't refund them (they were the no-change ones) so we may as well go and wnjoy!

Travelling long haul first class with a baby

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